TIPS AND TECHNIQUES

Sunday, June 25, 2017

Ooops 1 more post! I'm still working on scraps from various Graphic 45 papers. This time it's a Guy Card. We never seem to have too many ideas for these so when I come up with one I run with it! LOL If you remember I made a Golf card a bit ago and these are some of the left overs. I once again used the Friendship shutter design for this card for it is the best style for using tiny pieces. The Friendship card directions can be seen here. These are so quick to make.

I made this a Birthday card. I always seem to need a guy birthday card so this is going in my stash. Though you can't tell from the picture the bottom right soccer ball has a bit of Wink of Stella on the black parts for some shimmer. The star is popped up as well as the tickets. So are the little soccer balls on the red square.All in all pretty cute.Now I'm sure that's it for now..................HAPPY CARDING!

Hello! Well I know it's a bit past Graduation time tho some people are still having summer graduation parties. So with that in mind I decided to try a Graphic 45 graduation card for an adorable girl entering High School this year. Away with the cutesy cards and onward to a more grown up feel! I went through my papers and found this party sheet from Graphic 45. I decided to make a stair step card with a die I borrowed from a friend. and here's what I came up with:

The background is from the Mothers Goose collection. LOL...Humpty Dumpty is on the reverse side. I needed a pattern green and this worked! Anyway there is nothing on the steps although I suppose you could put the year on them but I didn't have any pink or green numbers and I was way too lazy to cut some on my Brother. So I just added some buttons on the steps and 1 on the front with little sliver paper scraps tucked behind it. The butterfly was from the Dollar tree. Pretty simple card considering the base is a die.That's it for now........................HAPPY CARDING!

It's time for another Christmas card. I know I have been quite involved with fancy folds and I love doing those but I needed a quick card for our Friday Ladies night.This card is your typical 4.25" x 5.5" card. No fancy fold...no fancy cuts.

The paper was a sheet of 12x 12 that I got at a Scrapbook store. They remove the little strip on the edge that tells you the company and name of the paper for easier storage in their shelves. Convenient for them a pain for me because I cannot pass the info along. Anyway I got it about a year and a half ago. It's double sided with the argyle print on back. I used red glitter washi tape between the papers for extra sparkle as well as using it on the tag and for the hole enforcer. I added a small ribbon to the tag and popped it up on front of the card.By the way a simple tip..................to make coordinating hole reinforcers just punch DSP or glitter paper or another color cardstock with your hand held hole puncher then with a 1/2" circle paper punch line the hole you just made in the DSP in the center of the punch and punch out. Perfect reinforcers. While I'm at it I thought I would share some other cards. First...one of the ladies needed a Thank you card and wanted to do one of those Hydrangea flowers so the group of us helped her along to design this card.

There is a cluster of 1 large and 3 smaller flowers puffs next to each other. Each puff was made by gluing tiny flowers on small circles then each circle was stacked on top another by using dimensionals. I takes about 4 circle layers per puff. That's alot of tiny flowers!!! The card base was made from shimmer paper embossed with a Dotted Swiss folder. The corner pieces were die cuts from Heartfelt Creations cut from white shimmer paper. Leaves were from a Poinsettia die (do not quote me tho since someone else cut them out and I didn't really see what they used)that were cut apart. Beautiful when finished and great job on every ones efforts to make this absolutely awesome. Next a Graduation card I helped my Daughter in law do. She picked the colors and wanted to do a Shaker card but wanted a step card too. We used Stephanie Barnard's stair step card die and just added a few more inches to 1 side and slipping it over the cutting ridge instead of under so it would not cut that end. A trick I learned years ago to enlarge the fronts of certain card dies. Then it was up to her to decorate.

She used stickers she was able to find at Michael's and some glitter numbers for the steps. She did a great job!That's it for now. Til next time..........................................HAPPY CARDING!

Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Hello! Well I visited my LSS and was inspired again for Christmas by buying alot more of the Graphic 45 St. Nicholas collection. On one of the shelves was a fun fold card that I knew I had not attempted. The girl behind the counter had no idea what it was called so I snapped a picture and decided to hunt it out once I got home. Well the style was called a Squash book. Continuing my Christmas theme and my use of Graphic 45 papers as well as my love for fun folds I decided to give this a try.

Above is the example that I snapped in the store and it was made with the Door County Line of papers exclusive of the Door County Rubber Stamp Store. Anyway I searched the Internet and Pinterest trying to find this type of card and came up with numerous video's for the Squash book but all of the ones I saw was using 3 pieces of paper. When the book was finished the inside squares measured 4 x 4. Well I knew the one I saw was a 3x3 so I searched that and also came up with tutorials where you used 3 pieces of paper. In my mind that's ridiculous since your pages were 3x3 you could just score and cut a 12 x 12 sheet. so that's what I did. One 12x12 sheet of cardstock scored at 3, 6, and 9 rotate and score again at 3, 6, and 9. Then 1st row cut off the last 2 squares, 2nd row cut off last square, 3rd row cut off 1st square and 4th row cut off first 2 squares. Should look like this:

Now fold top left corner to the center and the bottom right corner to the same center. Crease well. Should look like this:

Open again and take the top left corner and fold it to the bottom right corner making the paper completely folded in half. Like this:

Now go back and crease all the fold lines. Making sure they are well creased. It should look like this.....yes I changed papers because those pinkish ones are for my granddaughter and she wanted to fold them. We had a couple folding issues and had to start over.

Now accordion fold pushing triangles into place. Easier to do than explain but end results should look like this:

And when completely folded it's a little 3x3 squash book. On the outside squares seen on far left and far right is where we will be putting the 4x4 covers.Cut 2 squares 5.5 x 5.5 from DSP of Choice and cover 2 cardboard squares that measure 4x4. This will be the front and the back covers. Cut 10 Squares of DSP measuring 2 3/4 x 2 3/4. 6 of these will be cut in half diagonally. Attach each to the inside squares and embellish. Easy Peasy!! I know a couple ladies that just might dive in and give this a try.Here's my first one and of course its with more scraps of my Graphic 45 papers but I'll probably use up some of my Recollection papers too on another one.

And of course here's the one my granddaughter and I made for Fathers Day. She like it better when I'm doing the same one so the one I made went to my Husband from our youngest son. The Graphic 45 Sport Collection worked real well with this.

This was mine to my hubby.

Here's Tori's for her dad.

As I said the Graphic 45 papers worked wonderfully. Love using scraps! Well that's it for today. Going to try making another with Recollection papers. A more bright colored one!Til later..................................HAPPY CARDING!

Friday, June 16, 2017

I missed a friends Birthday and I wanted to do something different. Seeing that I am on a fancy fold kick I decided to do an easel card but with a twist. The main card base is 4.25" wide and 6" tall. By the time I finish adding extra pieces and embellishments the card will end up being roughly 6" x 6". I'm using my favorite paper line Graphic 45 and this time I'll be using 1 sheet from the Children's Hour Collection. The base of the card is made with a 12 x12 sheet of Pink Shimmer paper.Start with a piece of card stock (in this case pink shimmer) and cut 4.25 x 12. Score on the 12" side at 6 and at 9. Fold in half and then make at mountain fold of the 9" score line. This is the easel base. Cut another piece of the pink shimmer 4.25" x 6" This will eventually be glued on the lower half of the front of the easel base when completely embellished. Pieces glued on the bottom of the 4.25 x 6 are actually 6" wide therefore now making your card wider when completed. After all the papers and embellies were attached to the 4.25 x 6 pink shimmer it was attached to the main base.

I was going for a Shabby Chic look so I added lace, doily's, sequins, buttons and a little shimmer from my Wink of Stella pen.I think it's pretty cute and I can't wait for her to get it. Now to ship it out to Spokane! Oooppps............hope she doesn't read this post.Time to find another fun fold!HAPPY CARDING til then!

Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Hello!!! After a trip to relax I'm back with energy to make a few cards. Only 1 got done while I was away. Goodness I was sure taking it easy! LOL This card I did whip together with a few scraps from my Graphic 45 stash. This is exactly like the Friendship Shutter card I did earlier which can be seen here if you want more info on this card. More Christmas Shutter card examples will be posted later as I have a ton of scraps and this goes together so quickly.

Well I'm off to whip up a few more cards in between watching the Grandkids. Hope I can crank some out!Til then................................HAPPY CARDING!

Saturday, June 3, 2017

Hello! I am getting ready to be computerless (is that a word?) for the next 10 days so I'm trying to get my post up before the computer goes down. I had been busy working on a Gatefold card that went a bit wild. I saw the original on a Graphic 45 post and thought since I have alot of Graphic 45 scraps I'm going to give it a whirl. This card measures 5.5" x 7" an odd size yes and if I was more careful it should have only been a 5 x 7. I'll explain that later.

On the left is the card closed with a "Belly Band" to keep it from opening. This just slides off the side. In the second photo you can see a tab on the right side extending beyond the side of the card. This is where I made my mistake and caused the card to be a 5.5 x 7. I love the look though and decided that it would be a hand delivered card so it was OK.

A word of warning....................these are addicting! You stop....think your finished.....walk away...come back and you start adding little doodads here and there. LOL

I made card kits for my group which met up last night. Each kit had a different combination of papers. All embellishments were the same but not all used them. Here are a few of the ones made last night. First picture is of them open and then what they look like closed. First up mine.

And now here are two more

and 2 more

They all look so different and everyone there agreed that its addicting! I am sure to make more as special gifts over Christmas. I think these would look great as a display on a side table or mantle. There are no real directions. Your base card is 10 x 7. Made into a gate fold by scoring at 2.5 and 7.5. The added square which is added to the right front panel of the gate is a 4.75 x 4.75. You can see how it is only glued to the right side when the card is opened. The bottom front piece is a 2.25 x 4.75 piece and it too is attached only to the right side. This card is all about the layering. Pull out papers and just start covering every inch! Walk away and come back to add more. It really is quite fun. People will be impressed by what you can do with layers.Going to go but some New Graphic 45 papers and build one with more of a theme. Hmmmmmm wonder what that will look like??Til next timeHAPPY CARDING

During one of our ladies gathering for card making one of the ladies brought some dies from Scrapbooking Made Simplethat she bought awhile ago to create Shadow box cards. The Shadow Box's are awesome but the die to make the box requires a larger machine than the typical Big Shot. The decorative pieces would easily go through any machine (Big Shot, Big Kick, Cuttlebug) so we decided to first try those out. For the Shadowbox base card die you would need either the Spellbinders Platinum, Sizzix Big Shot Pro or the Fun Stampers Journey machine.

The finished size of this card is

The frame and the flowers are 2 separate dies. Very delicate and you must be very careful laying them onto the cardstock to get them on straight. The one on the far right I used liquid glue to adhere it to the base. A bit messy and you must work in very small spaces and work quickly so glue doesn't dry. It turned out OK but there were some places that a bit of glue seeped through. So we then decided to try a Xyron machine on the far left one. This left alot of sticky in the open spaces. I tried to rub it off but it wasn't really working. So I decided to try the next one (center). With this one I tried to remove the sticky before removing it from the Xyron backing. That didn't work either. So not wanting to throw out the 2 cards (left one and center one) I instead sprinkled glitter on the front and it now has sporadic glitter on the card. Passable but not really to my liking. I think I would go back to the liquid glue and just be more careful if I am to do this again.
One of the ladies has a larger machine and cut out the box bases for us. We did not have time or supplies to finish the boxes so that has to be left for a different post. We all think that we will be doing some sort of Halloween Shadowbox. We will see.'

Friday, June 2, 2017

Time for another Christmas Card. I want to be able to get as many Christmas Cards done before I head up to my summer cottage. We don't have Internet there so there won't be very many post over the summer except for when I come home periodically to take care of home business.I found another version of the Tri-Shutter card on Pinterest. Now I didn't search deeply but the first few cards I found no one included directions for the base. It didn't take long to figure this one out. It is a full front panel Tri-Shutter Card.

Hmmmm...can barely see the bling I added to the dots. Oh well I know they are there.I deliberately try to use nontraditional color combinations. So many times people are too obsessed with things matching and can't seem to envision mixing things up. One of the colors of the dots is blue and then there is a bit of blue with the snowman and the strip on the right panel. Do the blues match absolutely not but it doesn't matter. Its still a happy card.Dimensions are as follows:(1) 12" x 6" solid cardstock

With long side at top of scoreboard score at 4" and 8"Then place short end at top of trimmer and line up to 1" mark cut between the 6" and 10" marking of the cutting blade. Repeat on opposite side.As for the DSP....I would use your imagination. I used a 6x12 sheet of DSP and cut it to fit the various sections. All my sections had the same background but that is not necessary. Be creative! I think I might make another sample as a kit for ladies group. We all need to build up our Christmas stash.Til next time..................HAPPY CARDING!

About Me

Mother of 2 and grandmother of 2. We live where seasons have changes and to keep myself busy during the cold months I tend to work on alot of papercrafts. Cards are my ultimate favorite. I love creating and surfing the web looking for ideas and video's from fellow cardmakers.